America’s Most and Least Popular Senators

The latest edition of Morning Consult’s Senator Approval Rankings is available here.

If Americans were feeling optimistic about their senators at the dawn of the new era of a Republican-controlled federal government, many are souring on those elected officials as the 115th Congress rolls on, according to Morning Consult’s new Senator Approval Rankings.

More than half of all senators saw negative swings in net approval outside of the surveys’ margins of error in their respective states. By comparison, over 20 senators saw their net approval rating decrease in the first quarter of the year from the 2016 pre-election rankings.

On the Democratic side of the ledger, it’s Rhode Island voters who were most likely to appear embittered. Sen. Jack Reed saw his net approval rating drop 20 points, as did Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse. Roughly three in five Ocean State voters had previously approved of both senators, but for Whitehouse the share expressing approval slid below 50 percent in the new rankings. It was a similar story in Delaware, where the share of voters approving of Sens. Chris Coons and Tom Carper dropped from 58 percent and 65 percent to 52 percent and 58 percent, respectively, while their disapproval ratings rose.

Three senators — Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), Flake & McCain — were viewed negatively by a plurality of voters in their states. McConnell, consistently America’s least popular senator in the Morning Consult rankings, saw his net rating drop 4 points: Forty-one percent of Bluegrass State voters approve of him, while 48 percent do not. And Flake, who is considered one of the most vulnerable Republicans up for re-election, has the approval of 37 percent of Arizonans, compared with 45 percent who disapprove of his job performance.

While many senators saw net drops in approval, some managed to burnish their images in the eyes of their constituents. Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) saw the biggest jump (11 points), followed by North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven (7 points) and Sen. Joe Donnelly of Indiana (8 points), who’s considered a top GOP target ahead of the 2018 midterms. GOP Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Richard Burr of North Carolina each gained 4 points.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) remained the most popular senator in the country, with 75 percent of Vermonters approving of his job performance and 21 percent disapproving.

Sen. Luther Strange, who replaced fellow Alabama Republican and now-Attorney General Jeff Sessions earlier this year, is the only new addition to the list. Strange, who is working to fend off GOP challengers leading up to an Aug. 15 special election primary, has the approval of 44 percent of Yellowhammer State voters, compared with 30 percent who disapprove of him and 26 percent who didn’t know or had no opinion.